Winging Decorating A Cake...

I've decided I want to have a go at cake decorating. I have no idea what I'm doing, as I've never taken classes, but I'm pretty creative so thought I'd try my hand at it. I was just having a play at applying fondant, using some cutter shapes, and making some bows. Here's my results of my first ever cake:

I baked a white chocolate mud cake and covered it in pink buttercream. It was actually really huge so I was able to bake two full size cakes and layer them together. I'm interested to see how the recipe tastes as I've not used this recipe before. All my equipment is ready to go - the silicone rolling mat, the giant rolling pin, colours, fondant smoother, cutters, and the fondant has a lemon yellow tint already applied.

The cake with the fondant covered. It was easier than I thought. I thought I'd have folds and pleats and air bubbles everywhere but it was pretty simple. It did take me a while to roll out the right size fondant.

I then added hearts and stars using a dab of water. The stars were much harder to apply as there were quite fiddly. I also have some other shapes, as well as a kit with the alphabet and a kit with numbers.

 I then added a bow. It looks alright but not too great, but not bad for my first attempt. I let the loops dry a little around some rolled up Glad Wrap before applying them with water.

The finished product! I added little colour balls down the bottom to hide the rough edge. This is why people either use colour balls or ribbon on the bottom of cakes! 

I'm taking my cake to work tomorrow and then making a few more during the week. I'm having a gender reveal BBQ this coming weekend so will make a cake for that - my husband asked if I'd be modelling a baby for the top of the cake! I don't think I'm quite there yet!

Have you ever tried your hand at a new hobby? How has your success been?